Flight: All year in Florida and South Texas, July-August in the
north.

Caterpillar hosts: Milkweeds and milkweed vines. Some of the
milkweeds contain cardiac glycosides which are stored in the bodies
of both the caterpillar and adult. These poisons are distasteful
and emetic to birds and other vertebrate predators. After tasting
a Queen, a predator might associate the bright warning colors of
the adult or caterpillar with an unpleasant meal, and avoid Queens
in the future.

Range: Resident in extreme southern United States south through
tropical lowlands of the West Indies and Central America to
Argentina. Regular stray and sometime colonist in the plains;
rarely along Atlantic coastal plain to Massachusetts and the Great
Plains.

Comments: The Florida Viceroy (Limenitis archippus floridensis) is
edible, but mimics the Queen in order to gain some protection from
predators.

Conservation: Not usually required.

The Nature Conservancy Global Rank: G5 - Demonstrably secure
globally, though it may be quite rare in parts of its range,
especially at the periphery.